Annual Halloween Contest Support Thread

Thanks from a Literotica newbie, Sack!

I appreciate the positive comment and 5 vote on my story ('Statuary Rape'). I had fun writing it and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

I'm always pleased when an established writer such as yourself comments favorably on my initial efforts in story writing. Thanks again.

My stories got trolled to hell and back while I was gone... time to look up my next wave of buddies-for-bribes, I guess.

Entry #3 scared me too badly... I haven't typed it up yet. Written it out, yes. Typed- no.

Contests - Philosophical maunderings for a newbie

A friend who is new to contests PM'd to ask about contest rules, voting, dynamics, etc. My answer developed into an essay which I will share here:


Contests – Oi vey. Be prepared for slings and arrows. I think the first thing you need to recognize is that having written the best story does not mean you've written the winning story. I don't have to tell you all the ways in which Lit scores are "coarse" at the very best and highly skewed at the very worst. They give the appearance of precision with those two digits to the right of the decimal point, but in reality they should probably be rounded to the nearest whole number. They are very useful because they allow readers to separate the wheat from the chaff, but in reality are unsuited for making fine distinctions, as in contests.

And – they can be "gamed," in ways that are above-board, and ways that are not.

Why does author X have twice as many votes as the rest at a given point? She's very prolific and has a following. She's very good and deserves a lot of votes. And she's hustling for votes – she PM'd me, for example, and asked me to read her story. Nothing wrong with that. She and I respect each other but are not really close, though, which suggests that I'm not the only one she's asked. Again, fair enough, but to the extent such a "GOTV" campaign (Get Out The Vote) affects a contest outcome, that means it is not purely a function of which story is "best." And that's just one of the factors unrelated to pure merit.

Category can matter. I was glad that Kbate won the last contest with a Lesbian Sex story, because my sense is that this is unusual (and this is my cat). I suspect we'll not see many winners coming out of "Loving Wives!"

Contest stories attract a lot more votes and comments than others, and the vote tallies (and scores) are subject to wild gyrations – a lot of votes can disappear in an eyeblink. "Ridin' high in April, shot down in May." I don't understand what it's about really, but apparently some readers vote multiple times. Also, contest stories may score a bit lower. The story that I think is my best was in a contest and has a lower score than my others. I imagine in part this is because contests attract more readers who are discriminating and sophisticated, and so are tougher graders. They also attract more trolls.

Which leads this little essay to the dark side. The dirty tricks department. The one-bombs. We know it happens. We know (or should know) that some of them almost certainly come from other authors. It's human nature – "Man is created in the image of God, but is fallen" is an analogy I fancy. The Tour de France has blood doping, the Olympics has whatever today's version is of the "East German judge," and Lit has its trolls (for whom a high scoring contest story is like a magnet) and its dirty tricksters. All you can do is shrug and be philosophical about it. Well, you can rail at the skies and tear your hair out, too, but it won't improve your life or your contest chances.

Yes, it is easy for me to sit in my ivory tower on the sidelines and wax philosophical – I don't have an entry in this contest. I may have one in Winter Holidays, at which point expect to see me railing at the skies and tearing my hair out. And spitting at this little essay.


Edited to add this, just PM'd to me, which reports a very positive side of contest participation:

"This contest has increased my exposure about 10 times. The feedback has been unreal. I get the notion that anything I post from now on will be read by more than the usual 15 or so."

Yippee for my friend who sent this!

Roxanne Appleby said:

/snip.

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Has exceeded her private message storage allowance and cannot receive further messages until she cleans her message box.

kbate said:

Has exceeded her private message storage allowance and cannot receive further messages until she cleans her message box.

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Oopsie - it snuck up on me. Box all clean now.

TE999 said:

I appreciate the positive comment and 5 vote on my story ('Statuary Rape'). I had fun writing it and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

I'm always pleased when an established writer such as yourself comments favorably on my initial efforts in story writing. Thanks again.

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Hey, you made it to the thread! Welcome.

Roxanne Appleby said:

Oopsie - it snuck up on me. Box all clean now.

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*thinking*

Don't say it... don't say it...

Aurora Black said:

*thinking*

Don't say it... don't say it...

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I compliment you, Aurora, on your personal restraint. I know how much it hurts...having the same problem myself.

I'm concidering a booby trap for my stories with a Nuclear Device. When Cleveland disappears we'll know at least one troll is gone

TE999 said:

I appreciate the positive comment and 5 vote on my story ('Statuary Rape'). I had fun writing it and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

I'm always pleased when an established writer such as yourself comments favorably on my initial efforts in story writing. Thanks again.

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Just like I said in the comment, I'm jealous of this story. I had looked at the non-human cat several times, thinking "I need to write something different - no werewolves, vampires, aliens... how about a statue? That has some potential..."

I could never figure out how to make it work, though. Now I've been beaten to the punch

I caught up on a few more today, and I'll get a few more this evening. I haven't been leaving comments on everything but I'm going to get through voting on everything at least, dagnabbit.

Darkniciad said:

Just like I said in the comment, I'm jealous of this story. I had looked at the non-human cat several times, thinking "I need to write something different - no werewolves, vampires, aliens... how about a statue? That has some potential..."

I could never figure out how to make it work, though. Now I've been beaten to the punch

I caught up on a few more today, and I'll get a few more this evening. I haven't been leaving comments on everything but I'm going to get through voting on everything at least, dagnabbit.

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Yes it was a great story. I recommended it over in the GB yesterday along with a few others. Well Done, TE99

Darkniciad said:

I caught up on a few more today, and I'll get a few more this evening. I haven't been leaving comments on everything but I'm going to get through voting on everything at least, dagnabbit.

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*snicker*

Now this is the kind of feedback one really wants to find in their email. This contest has increased these about 10 fold

Comments:

Jenny_Jackson,
Hi! I just read "Harry Dick: Halloween Caper"
I really enjoyed it! A friend recomenned you, and you didn't disapoint!
you're story is extremly funny, and erotic enough to give me a twinge
too!
Great job!
Thank you,
Jim

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FallingToFly said:

My stories got trolled to hell and back while I was gone... time to look up my next wave of buddies-for-bribes, I guess.

Entry #3 scared me too badly... I haven't typed it up yet. Written it out, yes. Typed- no.

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I didn't think you can top "Smile" FtF... but I'd definitely like to read the effort!

Jenny_Jackson said:

Now this is the kind of feedback one really wants to find in their email. This contest has increased these about 10 fold

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You pulled me into a sci-fi story with Offering too, not an easy task. I'll catch up with the rest of yours before the contest ends, promise

The sheer volume of well-written stories in the contest is tremendous.

SelenaKittyn said:

I didn't think you can top "Smile" FtF... but I'd definitely like to read the effort!

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So you're done writing yours, then? *rubbing hands together, cackling*

Aurora Black said:

So you're done writing yours, then? *rubbing hands together, cackling*

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sooooo close...! almost there... just a little further...


writing... definitely talking about writing...

I'm not going to worry about further Halloween entries this year. I've got one in, and as I have a hard time not turning my vampire tale into a series, I don't see the point. Hopefully, next year can be a single chapter story, not a series. No more serial entries for me.

I'm still doing the vampire story, just not as an entry.

good evening...

Munachi said:

good evening...

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Was that done in a creepy, Count Dracula voice by any chance?

Aurora Black said:

Was that done in a creepy, Count Dracula voice by any chance?

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um... yes... but then i got scared of the echo and went hiding under the bed. so no one can see me now.

Munachi said:

um... yes... but then i got scared of the echo and went hiding under the bed. so no one can see me now.

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*eyes glowing in the dark*

maybe if i close my eyes no one can see me... ?

wow, seems it worked... but... hm... all have left... that's even more scary...

nonono... still here... just trying to decide what to do with all this blood.

Does Stanley Steamer do emergency jobs for under the table work, double the pay and no record that they were ever here?